Chapter 11
eleven
Matias
“Where the hell is Santos?” The distant shouts of hired guns ring in the cavernous warehouse as they move the last of the crates, making space for the next shipment.
They’re working as quickly as possible, but not fast enough.
We have a shipment coming in less than a week—and this is the safest warehouse in the city.
I needed this place emptied out yesterday.
“Santos!” Where the fuck is he?
A crate on the opposite side of the warehouse scrapes against the concrete floor. “Calm your tits, woman. I’m coming.” He ducks between a pair of men lugging a cargo-sized crate, clapping them on the shoulder.
He’s too busy being the class clown to notice the small crate of ammo in his path, and I watch in unadulterated amusement as he stubs his foot and almost falls face-first on the ground.
“Fuck! Who the fuck left this ammo in the way?!” He shifts his weight from one foot to the next, cursing quietly as he massages his foot.
“What did you just say again? Calm your tits…?”
Santos rolls his eyes at me. “It’s funnier when I say it.”
“Yeah. Okay.”
“Besides, isn’t enough that you stole all the shit in this warehouse? You’re going to steal my jokes, too? What’s next—you’re going to wear my face as a mask?”
I motion in his direction. “Why would I want all of…that?”
“You wish you had my face, fucker.”
I snort. “Keep telling yourself that, princess.”
I pluck my phone out of my pocket and read my messages, the silence in the shitty office punctuated by the beeping of one of the boxcar trucks. Santos taps his foot impatiently, cocking his head and watching me.
“Why did you call me here?”
I set the phone down. Straighten it along the edge of the old wooden desk. I don’t believe in beating around the bush, but I still measure my words with my best friend.
“Westfall thinks you got swindled at the races this week.”
His brows furrow, a strand of hair falling across his forehead. “What?”
“The totals aren’t adding up, Santos. Your guys were short by about fifteen hundred dollars.”
He relaxes. “Oh. That. I know about that.”
“Great.” I check my notes. “What about this ridiculous bet someone put on Demi? They’re getting a ten-fold flip on the bet, Santos. You know we’re not supposed to take high bets like that.”
“I know about that, too.” He says, waving me away. “Anything else?”
“Um, yeah. What the fuck is going on?” Something about his casual nature makes the back of my neck itch. “You double-dipping or something?”
Santos clicks his tongue. “Man, don’t say stupid shit like that to me. Especially over some dumb shit Westfall told you. For all you know, he’s robbing us blind and selling us out to the cops.”
“He’s fine.” I say. Not because I trust him, but because Westfall damn near pisses himself each time Santos and I walk into the room. He’s scared shitless. He doesn’t even sit in front of me—let alone take my money.
“No, he’s not fine. He can’t be trusted, Matias.
I don’t know what that little fucker told you—but the word is spreading.
I had people at the races talking about our numbers guy flipping for the cops.
You know how bad that makes us look? We’re losing money, man.
You have to get rid of him before it’s too late. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”
I hold up my hands, breathing deeply, until Santos does the same.
“Santos, I’m not trying to start shit. I just want to know what’s going on.” I hold up the numbers Westfall passed along. “We’re going to be out twenty-thousand dollars.”
“You wanna know what’s going on? Fine. I’ll tell you.” My best friend locks his hands together and plops them on his lap. “She came to the races.”
I hold up my hands. “Who?”
“Natalia.”
The name hits me like a wall of bricks. I freeze in place, something icy spreading in my stomach at the memory of her face. Of her eyes, her smile. The sweet scent of her skin and soft dip of her waist. The way she stared at me after I kissed her senseless…
“Oh, now you don’t have anything to say?”
I clear my throat, suddenly hating the silence. “What did she want?”
“She didn’t want anything. She came to see the races and bet a little—you should’ve seen the wrinkled wad of cash she was carrying, man. It was so sad. Like she used up her grocery money.”
I refuse to let myself picture the sight. “She…does she need money?”
He shrugs. “You think her dad is giving her money? She turned him in to the FBI. We’re lucky he didn’t send sicarios after her. All their money got taken by the cops, she has a real job now.”
I pause. Every scout I’ve sent to check on her had come back with photos. She looks clean, well-fed, and safe in each one of them. I’d be able to tell if she was struggling for money…right?
“How much do you think she needs?” I ask quietly, wanting to smack Santos when he snorts.
“You think she’s just gonna take a free handout?
From you?” He’s right, but I don’t like the way he says it.
“You broke her heart and left her on that hospital bed. She would rather starve than take your money. That’s why I hooked her up on the sly.
Make it look like I was just guessing. She had no idea it was all planned out. ”
I hate that he’s right—that he knows Natalia almost as well as I do. She always did the right thing, even if it pained her. That damn pride of her was always her undoing…
That lawfulness was our undoing. I wonder where we’d be, if this life hadn’t been so taxing on her.
“She asked about you, you know.”
I freeze. “Hm.”
Santos gives me a sly look. “Don’t act like you don’t want to know.”
“We’ve been over for four years, Santos.”
“Anyway,” he continues, completely ignoring me. “Even she heard about the rotten bookie. She looked worried about you. Really—she’s a saint. To give a fuck about you after the way you broke her heart?—”
“Whose friend are you?”
“Real friends don’t kiss ass. She really loved you. You know how hard it is in this line—to find someone that actually gives a fuck about us? Us? Not the guns and the money, and all that stupid shit.”
“I know.” I answer quietly, hating that after four years, her face is still the only one I see when I close my eyes at night. “How…how did she look?”
He glances at his watch. “You’re about to find out. I told her to meet me here to pick up her cash, but I gotta bounce.”
I stiffen in my seat. “Santos.”
“I have a very important appointment.”
“A booty call is not an appointment. We talked about this.”
He rises to his feet. “I gotta go, man. Man’s got needs. Pretty sure your blue balls have petrified by now, so you wouldn’t understand.” My best friend inches towards the door, ripping it open and?—
“Oh! Hey, shorty.” He calls out, waving at a shadow standing on the other side of the glass wall. “You’re very punctual these days.” A chiming voice replies, soft and light, but I can’t hear it. There’s a roaring in my ears that matches a racing thump in my chest.
I shift my weight from one foot to the other, briefly confirming that there’s no other way out of this damn office.
This is a mistake. I left Natalia for a reason. Santos pulling us together is only going to end badly?—
“So anyway, your money is right through here.” He pushes her into the room, clapping Natalia on the shoulder when she freezes.
“You remember this foo, right? He’ll make sure you get all your money.
And if he doesn’t, you let me know. I’ll shoot him.
” Santos laughs wholeheartedly, completely oblivious to the fact that he’s the only person in here smiling.
“Bye bye, Natalia. See you around.” The door slams shut, caging us into a silence so loud my ears ring.
Natalia gives me a fleeting look under her lashes before staring at her shoes.
I wish I knew how to stare at anything else, but no. I watch her like a stupid caveman for the better part of the most awkward minute of my life before I remember I’m capable of speech.
“Hey.” My voice is low and rough, and I hate it. I hate it even more when she jumps at the sound of it. I don’t want to sound scary—not to her.
She takes another peek at me. “Hi.” The meeting is so much like our first one, back in that church, that I almost smile.
Natalia looks a little different now. She’s sporting a bob—her hair swishing as she peers around the office.
It looks good on her, flatters the pretty features on her face, but I still hate it.
I loved it when it flowed long and wavy down her back, when I could wrap it around my fist, when it would fan across my chest like a blanket?—
“I’m just here to get my winnings.” She says, patting a thin tote bag. “And then I’ll be out of your hair.”
Right.
I broke her heart that night in the hospital. I left her when she needed me the most—I’d want nothing to do with me, if I were her.
“Sure.” I glance down at the paper in front of me, like I don’t know exactly how much we owe her. Still, I confirm the amount and pad it a little, just in case she’s short on cash. “You had a great night at the race track, hm? Twenty-five thousand?”
She furrows her brow. “That…sounds a little high—” I give her my back, unlocking the giant safe behind the desk and plucking money from it.
“These are stacked for every ten-thousand.” I place three stacks on the desk and push them toward her. “I don’t really feel like counting out five-thousand. Keep the change. Okay?”
I always loved how expressive her eyes were. How I could tell exactly what she was thinking.
And right now, she’s thinking I’m full of shit. Which is why I’m not surprised when she takes the third stack off her pile and slides it back across the desk at me.
“My winnings are twenty-thousand.” She says, giving me a pointed look as we stare at the last stack between us. “This is yours.”
Painfully honest, always the goody-two-shoes doing the right thing.
“Just take it.”